To make this stove all you need is a can of fancy feast cat food from Walmart and a hole puncher. Alcohol stoves are ultralight stoves, usually homemade from aluminum cans, that burn denatured alcohol, Yellow HEET, grain alcohol, and even rubbing. I would recommend using denatured alcohol as it has a good heat output and can be found easily at any Walmart neat the home improvement section.

There are a lot of advantages to using a homemade alcohol stove rather than a commercial backpacking stove: weight, simplicity, reliable, quiet, odorless, fuel can be bought anywhere, little to no maintenance, and very low cost. It may take a little longer to boil water than other stoves, but what else do you have to do while sitting by your fire after a day’s worth of hiking? I would say spare a few extra minutes and save a few extra ounces.